Muslim Culture in Canada

Last week in Cultural issues and diversity, a former CYW student and her sister came to speak about the Muslim Culture. I found this very interesting because i did not know very much about muslim people and i know that they face a huge amount of stigma, especially since 9/11 in the States.

 

I learned that the god of the Muslims is known as Allah, I didnt know the difference between "Muslim" and "Islam" there was a bit of confusion between separating the two and through sarah and her sisters presentation I learned that Muslim is their culture and Islam is their religion and their way of life. I looked up the actual meanings of each and came up with this :

 

Islam: " submit, accept, or surrender. From this comes Islam’s conventional definition of surrender to God." (differencebetween.net, 2012)

 

Muslim : "refers to a person who engages in the act of submission, acceptance, or surrender. Therefore a Muslim is a person who submits to the will of God, or a follower of Islam." (differencebetween.net, 2012)

 

I also learned about islamic prayer beads, which are called Misbaha or "Tasbih" which are made of: wooden beads, various stones and sometimes made of olive seeds, ivory, amber, pearls or plastic. The muslim Tasbih is made up of 99 beads, which are divided into sections of 33 beads. Each section is divided by a disc and is called a "Nisane" they are used for remembering "Allah" during prayer.

Prayer Beads:

picture retrived from:http://www.prayerbeadsworld.com/prayer_beads_in_islam.html

The presentation by Debbie, Eric and Kim last week in cultural issues and diversity was very informing and interesting. I had never really thought about how to work with youth from the LGBTQ community before and I was not very informed about the needs of the youth in this group and how CYWS can help. The activities that were used in this presentation had me thinking deeper into what it would feel like to be part of the LGBTQ community and just how many difficulties these youth face in their day to day lives. I am very grateful for Debbie, Eric and Kim’s presentation and for the thoughts, feelings and experiences they shared with us. I also learned about a few groups such as the Phelps from the united states who protest at soldiers funerals and the Ugandan government who is trying to pass as bill  to allow death to be a consequence of homosexuality.  People from these groups, who are completely against LGBTQ voice their opinions in horrible and disturbing ways. I think that the Say out Loud group is so important for these youth and I think that by getting the word out and continuing to show support to these youths, many issues can be avoided and dealt with in a more positive way.  Having this presentation also made me think more about “privilege” and just how much privilege straight people really have compared to people from the LGBTQ community. I believe that the say out loud group not only offers support but is the first step in overcoming bullying, especially in the LGBTQ community and if people continue coming together in this way it could lead to further acceptance for everyone.

Bullying is a huge issue these days and I know that the LGBTQ youth face so many issues with bullying. I think that it is very important for people who support the community to especially focus on bullying with in the LGBTQ community.  After the presentation I did a little more research on homosexual bullying and I also did some extra reading from the resources on blackboard . I read about the Trevor project and found it to be a very interesting organization for supporting LGBTQ youth.  After creating a film about a young boy who was bullied for having feelings for another boy, the founders of the Trevor project then realized that maybe there are youth in the same situation that needed support. They then created a line for LGBTQ youth to call for support when they need it. Since technology is becoming more and more important,  I really like that the founders James Lecesne, Peggy Rajski and Randy Stone continued learning about the needs of these youth and came up with different ways of providing services. They have now created Trevor Chat which is a way to provide counseling for youth through instant messaging as well as a huge social network for LGBTQ youth called “Trevor Space”. I feel that having the option to go online for advice and support may be a lot easier for some youth to do rather then seeing a counselor in person or talking on the phone. I like that they have been able to appeal to so many different LGBTQ youth.  Below is the webpage for The Trevor Project as well as their logo

 

                                                      http://www.thetrevorproject.org/

 

Here is a video called “it gets better” made by the disneyland with many different people from the LGBTQ community sharing their bullying experiences and giving hope. This video reaches out to many different types of youth from the LGBTQ community and the people speaking are from many different age groups.

 

 

As a future CYW I feel that this presentation was very useful and informing to help me support LGBTQ youth in the best ways that I can. Although, I do find it very hard to word things when talking about the LGBTQ community, even while writing this blog. I feel that it is hard to know what words are okay to use and what words are not okay to use when talking about this community and I can imagine that people who are not as open to the LGBTQ community most likely find it very hard to be accepting and understanding of this community and probably find it much harder to use words that are appropriate when referring to the LGBTQ community. Therefore, I think that as a CYW it is very important for me to not only support this community but be able to help other people to understand and support them as well.